Field of the Invention
This invention concerns postage stamp dispensers. More particularly, this invention relates to portable type postage stamp dispensers such as would be used to hand stamp, in a convenient manner, parcels, envelopes, etc. Containers for postage stamps are quite notorious. A particular form of postage stamp dispensing is that in the roll form. Postage stamps of common denomination, such as a postage stamp necessary to mail, by first class, an ordinary business letter, are often sold in roll form. It is not unusual to have available small cylindrical dispensers which permit the manual tearing off, licking and pressing on a business envelope, thereby dispensing the stamps.
Other sorts of postage stamp dispensers are known. These are complex bulky mechanisms more suited for large offices or mass mailing situations. For such uses, it is more typical to use postage meters which are licensed to business, etc., to care for their postage requirements. For the typical postage stamp user, these large machines are entirely inappropriate. Accordingly, there has been little practical solution to the problem of dispensing, one at a time, a postage stamp and moistening the same without considerable sanitary problems normally associated with manually tearing off a stamp, licking the stamp and placing it on the envelope.
The instant invention solves many of these problems by providing a compact, aesthetically presentable, postage stamp dispenser specifically designed to retain, dispense, moisten, separate and press a postage stamp selectively onto an envelope, parcel, etc. to this end. The instant invention comprises a dispenser for a roll of postage stamps and the like. As is well known, a roll of postage stamps has a known width and each stamp is defined in length by a series of perforations extending substantially across the width of the stamp. The device of the present invention provides a means for retaining such a roll of postage stamps and, associated therewith, a means for deploying the stamps in series from this retaining means. Also provided is a means for automatically moistening a stamp deployed by this means for deploying while retaining the remaining stamps in the roll within the dispenser for later dispensing. This device also includes a means for separating the stamp just moistened by the means for moistening from the stamps remaining in the dispenser.
The device further includes means for pressing the just moistened stamp substantially onto the surface of the envelope immediately after being moistened and separated by other portions of the device. All of these operations to the dispensed stamp, that is the deploying, moistening, the separating and the pressing are accomplished by the operation of a single push button located near the top surface of the case of the dispenser.